Reah loved walking on the old grasslands; the tiny blue chalkhill butterflies were chasing each other in pairs across their vast playground. In the distance, the sheer chalk and flint cliffs of the virgin sisters rose from the rock shore…Haven Brow, Short Bottom, Short Brow, Limekiln Bottom, Rough Brow, Rough Bottom, Brass Point… Reah smiled at the names, a litany of her childhood and echoes from the Middle Ages before the Black Death wiped out the local farming community.
Cows and sheep grazed on the banks of the river and a single yellow canoe paddled towards the sea, the ebbing tide taking it out to Cuckmere Haven. It was a favourite area for canoeists.
Reah began to climb the steep slope using the terracettes as footholds. Her breath came fast as she pushed herself to climb the first sister in record time; from shingle shore to three hundred feet in three minutes. It was exhilarating.
At the top, she surveyed the view around, the strong wind whipping at her clothes, her ears humming with the sound. From here the sea looked smooth, shimmering with weak sunlight that was breaking through the clouds. The canoeist was a mere yellow blob, paddling determinedly. Ewart was down there in the coastguard cottage, working on his play.
It was in the air that Reah first sensed the storm. What had been a still grey sky moments before was on the move. She strained her ears, listening intently, and detected a different note. It came again, a long long way off… the low, faint rumble of thunder.
She hesitated. If it was coming inland, she would not want to be caught out on the hills.
She noticed white flecks below where earlier the sun had been dancing on the waves. The sea’s colour had changed, darkened; all the blue had vanished into the depths. There was not a sea bird in sight, not a single fulmar or herring gull on wing.
This decided Reah, only just in time. The first drops of rain fell as she began the tricky descent. It was too steep and slippery to hurry. She was going to get wet.
Suddenly the storm hit the land. The force of the wind almost knocked Reah flying. She gasped, struggling to her knees, clutching at a tough crop of tor grass. She stuffed her hat into her waistband and using both hands moved crab-wise down the chalky path.
Lightning flashed vividly in the sky over the Seven Sisters; loud cracks of thunder erupted deafeningly overhead; the rain wiped out the distant sea view.
Reah hurried downwards, slipping and sliding the last few yards to the barbed wire fence. She wanted to get away from the cliffs quickly. They were unstable and the rain could loosen the chalk.
It would be quicker to reach the shelter of the coastguard cottages. She ran along the shingle, the rough waves cutting irregular patterns in the glistening pebbles, rock pools and runnels forming beneath the onslaught of the incoming tide. The rain blew hard and needle-like against her face.
When Reah reached the flood bank, it was already too late to wade across to the other side. The tide was racing in on the current, blown by the storm and moving up the estuary in a relentless formation of white-topped waves. She stood, panting. She had come this way all for nothing. The cottages were so near, just across on the other bank, a little way up Short Cliff.
Two figures came out of the cottages. One was the coastguard in glistening oilskins; the other she knew at once was Ewart. They were running down the concrete path that led to a small sandy shore, pulling a boat out from under the cliff and dragging it down to the sea edge.
Reah gasped as she realised their intention. They were putting out to sea in the storm.
“No! Ewart! Come back,” she shouted. The wind tore her words away and tossed them into the air. She knew why they were going. The canoeist was out there in his frail yellow craft, a boy in a yellow life-jacket. Ewart would have seen him from his desk.
She ran alongside the channel, calling and waving, but the men did not hear. She heard the phut-phut of the engine as the boat slipped into the sea, almost immediately bucketed and tossed about by the waves.
“Ewart…” she cried, her voice an agony of despair. She watched the boat head to sea, the mist and rain swallowing it as if it had never existed. The sea was taking the other man that she loved; she knew she loved Ewart.
Lightning flashed across the sky with pronged streaks, stabbing the dark clouds. A crack of thunder followed immediately and violently, jolting Reah out of her dazed horror.
She must get help. She ran back to the trail path already awash with water, stumbling over unseen ruts. In some places she could not even see the path and found herself floundering near the edge of the mudflats, half blinded by the stinging rain, in league with a ferocious wind that took Reah’s breath away.
The storm did not frighten her, but she was scared of losing her way among the salt marshes and mudflats of the estuary. The tide was racing in, driven by the wind, and the trail was disappearing fast.
That fear was caught in her greater fear for Ewart and his companion somewhere out in that tempestuous sea. Their boat would be like a toy on those mountainous troughs.
She was chilled to the bone, gathering all her strength to reach the inn at the entrance to the trail. She had to telephone the lifeboat station to tell them that the men had put to sea.
The mist was thickening, throwing Reah’s sense of direction. She panicked, and began to run, stumbling, gasping, her feet often ankle deep in the surging water, not just rain but waves. The tide was coming in faster than she could run.
Her own danger suddenly struck her. No one knew where she was. She could just disappear, sucked under by the mud.
Wet feathers brushed her face and she screamed. The bird flapped its wings and veered off into the darkness taking strands of her hair in its claws.
When she pitched into the wooden entrance stile, she almost collapsed against it in relief.
She knew where she was now, near the road. Lights loomed through the rain. Where there were lights, there would be people…telephone, cars, help…the norm of civilisation which had not existed in the last ten minutes.
“Please, help. Someone help,” she cried, rapping on the door of the inn.
The door was open and she fell inside, a wild-eyed drenched creature, muddied to the knees, her red hair plastered to her skin.
“Get the lifeboat,” she gasped. The faces at the bar were just a blur. “Please telephone. There are two men out in a boat and they need help.”
“This lass is all but done in,” said the innkeeper, putting down the glass he had been wiping. “Get her a brandy, Mabel. Steady now. I’ll telephone the lifeboat station though I reckon they’ve already been called out in this storm.”
“They went to rescue a boy in a canoe,” said Reah, shivering.
“Where d’you say this boat is?”
“They put out in C-Cuckmere Haven, near the old coastguard cottages. Please hurry.”
The innkeeper shook his head. “These heroes. We never run short of heroes. I’ll get on to them right away. Now you drink this before you catch your death.”
A glass was put in her hand and she drank obediently although her stiff fingers could hardly hold it. Someone guided it to her mouth. It almost choked her, fiery and heart racing. Mabel drove her home.
Later, the police called to tell her that the lifeboat had been called out several times in the storm; that Ewart Morgan had reported his sighting of the boy in the yellow canoe, but there was no sign of any of them. No news at all.
She sat huddled in front of the fire, her clothes still wet and steaming on her. She should have known that Ewart or the coastguard would have telephoned before putting out to sea. They were both sensible, responsible people.
Reah was living her nightmare now. The familiar cottage was no comfort. Ewart…Ewart…without Ewart there would be no point in living…anywhere.
Her heart ached with numb misery. She could have borne the knowledge of him taking another woman to that Alpine meadow, however hurtful that might have been. But he would have been alive, living, loving, giving. He would be somewhere, breathing, working, ta
king his full allotted span even if it was with some other woman.
She could have lived with that agony, learned how to live without him.
But if he died…she saw his face so clearly: those dark granite eyes, that taut profile, the soft fringe of hair. She did not want to be part of a world that did not hold him.
How long Reah sat in the gloom, she had no idea.
Time had no meaning. She was hardly aware of the door opening; it was only the coldness of the draught on her already chilled body that made her turn. A dark figure filled the doorway.
“Ewart?” she whispered.
“Reah…darling.”
They were in each other’s arms, clinging, fiercely, unable to speak, the relief of being together was enough. There was no need to kiss. The kisses would come later. They were overcome with the joy of finding each other and knowing without a doubt that they cared.
“Ewart…” Reah sobbed against his wet cheek. “I thought you were never coming back. I thought that you had drowned and that I would never see you again and you would never know that I love you.”
“I am here. Don’t cry,” he soothed. “Nothing can part us now. Never again. We are together. But…tell me again.”
Reah looked up at Ewart, her eyes warm with hope. She saw his strength and gentleness.
“I love you,” she said. “I love you so much.”
“Darling girl, at last!” His voice was impassioned. He flung his head back as if unable to bear the joy. “I always thought you were too proud and too independent to love anyone, let alone me, an arrogant writer, whom half the time you acted as if you hated. When I’ve loved you to distraction almost since that first day when you lost your hat over the cliff!”
“Me?…I?” Reah was incoherent, bewildered. “You hardly showed it.”
“I’ve been running away, scared out of my wits. Scared of losing my precious freedom, afraid of being caught by a skinny, young woman with red hair. When I dashed off to Milan, I was running away from you.”
Reah drew back from him so that she could see his face. His eyes were blazing down at her; the fire ignited a warm throbbing glow in her veins.
“You were running away from yourself,” she said.
“I know. I was an idiot. We were both blind. Why do you think I’ve been coming to your rescue so often? I’ve spent hours, days, worrying about you. I couldn’t bear to let anything harm one hair of your dear, impetuous head. I wanted to take care of you all the time— and you wouldn’t let me.”
“Of course not,” said Reah, but the softness of her voice belied the words. “I can take care of myself. But what can I do if you go out to sea in s-storms, when I love you so much. I didn’t want to live if you…if you had…”
He brushed his mouth gently against her lips to stop the torrent of anguish.
“No more tears, Reah. I’m safe and so is the boy. The lifeboat picked us up about a mile from the shore. The engine of the small boat was swamped with water.”
“Promise me you’ll never do anything like that again,” she cried, gripping his arms. “Promise me.”
“You know I can’t make that kind of promise, Reah,” he said. “Besides, who was running a one-woman marathon against the tide? You could have just as easily been hurt.”
“I knew what I was doing,” said Reah, defending herself. “I’ve known the estuary since I was a child, which is more than I can say for you.”
“There was no way I could watch that boy being carried out to sea and do nothing. We are not the kind of people to tie each other down with pointless promises. Our marriage won’t be a bonded cage but something gloriously free. Loving and trusting each other will be its strength.”
“Marriage?” Reah looked at him with a growing happiness. “Is the famous Ewart Morgan actually suggesting marriage?”
“Not suggesting…stating. We are getting married. But I’m not going down on my knees in these wet clothes. You’re frozen! It’s time we both got out of our clothes and into the tub. Does this antiquated cottage possess a bathroom?”
“Of course,” said Reah shyly. “There’s plenty of hot water. You go first. Did you say marriage?”
“Yes, I did. I mean it. And don’t look so alarmed,” he chuckled. “I’ve already seen you in the bath, remember?”
Reah found herself blushing but that memory was crushed into oblivion as Ewart’s mouth came down with a burning kiss that took her breath away. She flung her arms round his neck and pulled him closer, her slender body pressing against the hardness of the man she loved. She wanted him so dreadfully.
Their bodies caught alight with desire. Ewart began to peel off her wet shirt, his fingers seeking the tiny buttons without hesitation. Her bare shoulders were pale and satiny in the half light.
“How I adored you that night in Florence, so long ago, when you stood there wrapped in a ridiculous sheet, making your declaration of rights. You were wonderful. I wanted to tell you then that I loved you, but would you have believed me?”
“No,” said Reah. “How could I, when you had just tried to rape me. There was no love in you that night.”
He was touching her shoulders gently, lightly. She turned her head this way and that, moving under his touch.
“Perhaps not. Love and hate are very closely entwined. You were driving me wild. When I saw you with that young Italian, I went insane with jealousy. I wanted to make you mine…at any cost.”
“The cost was almost too high, my darling,” said Reah.
“I have a beautiful moonlight dress waiting for its owner to claim it.” He smiled. “Also a green thing with slashed sleeves. Do you always leave your clothes all over the place? You’ll have to stop that habit when we are married.”
“So you have them… I had been wondering.” It was becoming almost impossible to talk as their kisses deepened and grew more intense.
“And I have a sketch of the head of David, given to me by a talented young artist as a protest. Perhaps one day she’ll sign it. I’ll have it framed, and it will hang in the study of our home so that neither of us will ever forget Florence.”
“We’ll never forget Florence,” Reah sighed.
“You’re beautiful Reah…so beautiful,” he murmured.
He kissed the hollow of her throat, his lips moving over her skin with sensitive probing; she could feel her body becoming weak with a longing to be loved. Waves of sweet elation carried away her last doubts. She loved him and wanted to be loved.
“Ewart, darling,” she whispered. “Love me, love me now…”
“This time nothing is going to stop us,” he said, his dark eyes glinting. “We are together and the door is locked against the outside world. It’s still raining and no one can even see in the windows. It’s you and I, and all the time in the world.”
“I can’t think of anything I’d like more,” said Reah, touching his face with infinite tenderness.
“I’m going to carry you upstairs and make love to you until you fall asleep in my arms, full of sweet content and happiness,” said Ewart. She could feel that the desire in his caressing mouth was barely restrained. She knew that when his passion was unleashed, it would be like nothing she had ever known before.
“It sounds…wonderful,” she said breathlessly.
“It is wonderful,” he said. “And no one is going to interrupt us. I’m going to make sure of that.”
He leaned away from her momentarily. The dark hair on his chest was still glistening from the rain. He reached for the telephone and took the receiver off the hook. A faint buzz came from it; the engaged signal was in for a long session.
“But supposing Miss Hardcastle tries to telephone me,” said Reah, trying to sound shocked.
“I’ve a feeling Miss Hardcastle would approve,” said Ewart.
He lifted her up in his arms, their mouths clinging, hair tangling, skin tingling, their senses drowning but drowning in a sea of love.
“To bed, my darling…” he said.
“It�
�s not an Alpine meadow,” said Reah.
“Oh, but it is,” said Ewart. “Can’t you smell the flowers?”
About the Author
Stella Whitelaw has been writing since the age of nine when her father gave her a second-hand portable typewriter. She was in bed with measles and, covered in spots, she immediately started to teach herself to type.
She progressed from short stories in national magazines to writing novels. She is a cross genre writer with 15 crime books, eight books of cat stories and many romance mysteries. She is currently writing the ninth book in the acclaimed Jordan Lacey PI series. It’s called Jazz and Die.
Her short story won the Art of Writing competition in The London Magazine, judged by Sheridan Morley. She was short-listed for the Catherine Cookson memorial prize and was awarded the Elizabeth Goudge Cup at Guildford University by the RNA.
Her hobbies, when she has time for them, are singing, walking and of course, reading.
Look for these titles by Stella Whitelaw
Now Available:
Flood Tide
Coming Soon:
Pennyroyal
The Secret Taj
The island paradise would be perfect, if only she could remember her name…
The Takamaka Tree
© 2012 Alexandra Thomas
A mysterious woman…
Washing ashore on a tropical beach, she awakes to find herself with no memory of how she came to be there. Helpless and hurting, she is grateful that she is not alone.
A curious man…
Daniel, a scientist studying local bird migrations, discovers the mystery woman, and suspects that she may have been a passenger on a recently missing yacht. Now if he can only figure out who she is…
An island paradise…
Among the sand, sun, and verdant Takamaka trees, they both work to unravel the mystery of her arrival on the island…all while falling in love.
Enjoy the following excerpt for The Takamaka Tree:
Her mouth was full of sand. Her first conscious thought was the unpleasant sensation of fine grit caking her tongue and teeth.
Flood Tide Page 12
